The present invention relates to a housing for use in a vehicle to accommodate a printed circuit board carrying electronic components.
A wide array of requirements is made of such a housing: for example, it should be as inexpensive to manufacture and should occupy as little space as possible. It is also advantageous if the very same housing can be used, regardless of the installation site, of the installation conditions prevailing there and of the shape of the printed circuit board, or else if the housing can be adapted to the installation conditions and/or to the design of the printed circuit board by means of changes that are easy to effectuate. Housings known so far from the state of the art, for example, have a housing designed as a composite body consisting of a metallic base plate and a plastic body. The base plate projects beyond the plastic body on two sides and, on the projecting edge strips, it has fastening openings by means of which the housing can be fastened, for example, to the car body. The position of the fastening points as well as the outer design of the housing are fixed. The electric contact between the printed circuit board and the base plate is made, for example, by means of a tab that is stamped out of the base plate and that is bent upwards in the direction of the printed circuit board.
The present invention provides a housing that, with a compact design, offers an optimal printed circuit board utilization and that can be manufactured and mounted especially inexpensively.
According to the invention, the printed circuit board is mechanically and electrically conductively connected on at least three of the four corners of the hood to metallic mounting bushings. At each of these corners, the hood has a mounting flange and the mounting bushings are anchored in the mounting flanges of the hood. The mounting bushings penetrate the openings formed in the printed circuit board. Since the printed circuit board extends to the corners of the base plate and of the hood, and since the base plate does not extend beyond the hood, a very compact housing is formed whose base surface area can be occupied almost entirely by the printed circuit board. At the same time, via the mounting bushings, an electrically conductive connection can be established between the printed circuit board and, for example, the car body. The simple xe2x80x9cputting togetherxe2x80x9d of the individual components as well as the small number of different components translate into a rapid, simple and thus inexpensive assembly.
According to a preferred embodiment, the hood has a recess at each of the three corners allowing a tool to gain access to fastening screws that are inserted through the mounting bushings. Thus, the housing can be mounted simply, for example, onto the body of a vehicle.
According to another preferred embodiment, the plug collar is optionally arranged on a long or short narrow side wall of the hood. If it is arranged on a short narrow side, the plug collar extends as far as to the area of that one of the four corners of the hood where no mounting bushing is provided, so that the housing is only fastened via the three remaining mounting bushings. Since only three of the four possible mounting bushings are used for fastening purposes, there is a relatively great freedom in selecting the attachment points. The possibility of attaching the plug collar selectively on either of the two narrow sides that are adjacent to each other makes it possible to adapt the exterior shape of the housing to the installation conditions, and this gives greater freedom in terms of the design of the printed circuit board.